


Ultimate Care

by Spacegaywritings



Series: Bad Therapists have a special Place in Hell [6]
Category: Cartoon Therapy (Web Series), Sanders Sides (Web Series)
Genre: Anxiety, Emile being shit, Implied Politics, Janus fucks capitalism and Emile, Lack of Compassion, Logan - Freeform, Power Imbalance, cousins loceit, criticising The System :tm:, emile no, feelings of threat, hospital mention, implied power abuse, institutionalisation, lawful neutral? Janus., lawlessness, mean stabs at others, mentions of lies and cheating., mentions of structural issues, nb janus, not understanding feelings, rivalry feelings, talks of injustice and fairness, unethical therapists
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-06
Updated: 2020-12-06
Packaged: 2021-03-09 22:55:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,487
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27924142
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Spacegaywritings/pseuds/Spacegaywritings
Summary: Janus has issues feeling empathy and compassion and talks about how much it bothers him since it impairs his interpersonal relationships. Emile tells him he just does not care enough and is human garbage so he might as well tell everyone he is a psychopath and be proud of apathy.
Series: Bad Therapists have a special Place in Hell [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1940389
Kudos: 9





	Ultimate Care

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for going throught this series until this last one (whether you fully did or not!). It means a lot to me.  
> Remember to stay safe and not to trust manipulative and shitty therapists!!
> 
> Also, have the regular disclaimer and feel free to leave comments and kudos
> 
> Disclaimer: writing based on subjective experiences based on therapy, mental health issues and (LOCAL) stigmas. You might have better/worse/different experiences with your struggles and how they were perceived and treated. Your culture or surroundings might have different bias. This is for venting and does not objectively apply to everyone’s experience of their mental illness or struggles.

The afternoon blew into the world, slowly darkening the sky.   
Less and less cars drove outside and people were drawn into the safety and the warmth of their homes.

Inside, doctor Emile Picani worked up the last bit of mental capacity to deal with yet another client for the day.  
He really should cut down his hours and work a bit less but it was still better than being at home. He wanted to work for as much more as he could before he was too old.

He scraped his papers together and checked in with his computer.

“Janus Scalian”, he mumbled to himself as he glanced over the registered name. The receptionist would go home now. Emile grumbled silently.

It was just a few moments before this person would come in. He needed to compose himself. He sighed to himself, flushing out the negative feelings in his system. Just breathing it out and breathing good feelings inside.  
Yes.

Some patients really did test his patience sometimes.  
Today had just been an especially provoking day with more than one client around to defy his methods and question his integrity as a professional.  
The doctor put his things aside and gave the receptionist the okay to let Janus inside and pack up.

A few moments from then, the door opened and a .. person stepped inside. If Emile had not the files open to check the gender assigned at birth, he would have been too confused to evaluate it on his own. A lean man entered. His posture was as straight as he was not and his facial features were soft enough to make him look almost feminine but his flat chest and rather average build were not indicative his gender.

Emile’s face scrunched up.

The patient was one of these people with colourful hair. Yellow and orange strands framed his velvet face. Despite his high cheekbones, he looked so androgynous. The professional was confused but he nodded at the other’s arrival.  
Heavy black boots stomped over the floor as if to establish dominance over the ground, to make it quiver and fear the other. The patient, face nonchalant and silent, plopped down onto the couch and looked at the therapist.

“Oh, good evening. You must be Mister Scalian?”

The person vaguely looked over the other. He did not look at him. Instead, he seemed to look past him, somewhat challenging the other with his dismissive refusal to acknowledge the other’s presence.

“Evening.”

The therapist clicked his tongue.

“Who are you?”

The person rolled his head back. He leaned against the couch with his back and neck. His pastel purple beanie touched on the neutral couch.

“Janus.”

Emile pushed his lips into a smile. There was no spark in his eyes. There was nothing and nobody in his eyes.

“I am doctor Picani, nice to meet you. You want me to call you Janus?”

The other nodded but then shrugged.

“Preferably but whatever, I guess. You are here to help me. As long as you do your job, I don’t have to worry about the names you call me.”

The therapist scowled at him, just for a moment. He quickly shook his head, covering up how he changed his facial features to soften in front of a client.  
A weird air stood between them. The upcoming night fell onto the world, slowly lowering over the city and cooling the world. Despite the fall in illumination and temperature, the tension between the two seemed thick enough to be tangible.

“What brings you here, today?”

The person looked at Emile, observing eyes analysing the therapist as if their roles were reversed. Janus was superior, he was in charge and in lead of the conversation. The professional shivered at the thought but attempted to remain composed.  
Janus was staring through him with condemning eyes of wood. Straightforward, hard, natural.

He was so unafraid, it was ironically scary. 

“I came here because I want to be social. I have issues understanding people and relating to them. It is hard to keep up relationships when I don’t really see what people mean when they talk about feelings. I lost a relationship to that and I am done with it. Do you help with these things or are others more qualified?”

The cold stare made Emile’s insides squirm. His feet were firm on the ground and he gripped his clipboard like a lifeline or the tool of a criminal about to strike.

“Of course I can! I can help with everything. Now, social things can be tough but that does not mean you have a real issue or a disorder. Can you elaborate on your problems?”

Janus brushed over his hands.  
They were dressed in clothings of their own. Neat gloves in the colours of coal and lemon. Even these simple fingers seemed to think of themselves as higher, somewhat more precious than Emile. The doctor pressed his teeth together and looked at his clipboard, scribbling down his expressions.  
The client innocently blinked, softly smiling.

Malice sparkled in his dark orbs. For a moment, it felts as if his wooden eyes were on fire but they were not. When Emile gazed up once more, making sure there was not even a single spark of heat, he could see nothing but cold, hard eyes floating over him in unlimited distance.

“My ex broke up over a fight of some sort. They said I did not have feelings and this is not the first time this has happened to me. I have issues relating to people’s emotional side.”

Janus cleared his throat.

“When people talk about empathy, about feeling for others, I can only imagine what it’s like. It is not like I can feel things. I neither feel anyone’s feelings, nor can I feel my own. All I feel are physiological needs and this is about it. I do care about others... well, these feelings are nothing compared to what others seem to feel.”

The patient rolled his eyes. The wooden circles went round and round while Emile took excessive notes of what the other was saying. He had dedicated this session to nothing but noting down any and all wrongs and issues he could find in the other.  
He soaked in all vulnerability and bathed in the helplessness that brought the other into his care. His hands were shaking in excitement when he thought of having the control over the other and have him feel and talk at the mercy of his judgement.

“So, you are saying you have no empathy for people?”

He looked at the doctor. The couch quivered underneath him as he put one leg over the other and arched one eyebrow in mild interest.

“Yes.”

The word wiggled around Emile like a snake. A tight feeling caught the doctor in his chest. It seemed to nestle behind his ribcage, refusing to take flight in the cold environment of his physical vessel.  
He suppressed a shiver and instead shook his shoulders.

“Ah, it got cold. I am glad I closed the windows”, he smiled at the other.

“I don’t care. I came her to discuss my issues, not the weather. It gets colder at night, yes, I learned that in school, too. Can we now move on from basic principles of geography?”

The therapist scoffed.

“Watch your tone. I have the feeling your parents did not teach your proper manners. You are being incredibly rude and I will not take the responsibility of caring for you in the form of therapy if you cannot bring up the minimum amount of respect.”

Janus clicked his tongue.

“Uh.. noted”, he spoke and shrugged as if to dismiss the subject as a mere casualty of life, “why is it rude?”

The doctor squinted at him, his face like a scowl.   
He very much seemed like a parent about to reprimand Janus for something he had done. On the other hand, the patient just looked over at him. His eyes were innocent at most and uncaring at worst. The nonchalant attitude of the other had him fidget in his chair.

“You are implying my information is worthless to my evaluation of your issues. You are not the professional here and you should leave it up to me to decide whether you have an issues that needs to be treated and whether I can treat it. Maybe you need to be referred to someone else or even receive special care. We need to go slow and you cannot just go around saying my questions to you are not important.”

Janus looked at him, sucking his cheeks in before pursing his lips and clicking his tongue once more.

“Okay. Got it. It is uh, belittling or something. Sorry. Did not mean to snatch ya titles and tell you you don’t know shit. You do. I got it. You are the professional here. I don’t know why you are asking these questions but they feel boring to me.”

The therapist held up his pen like a warning.

“Calling them boring is also rude.”

Another nod came from Janus’ small head and the professional gave a self-satisfied hum.

“Okay. Non-transparent questions that seem superfluous to me but not to you.”

He shrugged.  
Emile arched an eyebrow but let go off the topic when Janus’ face seemed as nonchalant as always. Something red burned inside of the doctor but he could not place the name of this feeling. Maybe he needed a feelings chart.

“They are important”, he repeated. His voice had a special pressure to it, as if to reinforce what he had said so many times, again and again and again.  
“Well”, he clapped, “on to the questions. I need to ask you a lot of questions even if they do not apply to you, so I can rule out certain issues we classify.”

The patient nodded again.  
His face was unreadable.  
He looked liked a lonely student in a two-hour lecture that just kept dragging on with a professor never changing pitch or pace of speaking at all.

“What do you feel right now?”

The patient shrugged.

“Nothing, to be frank. Should I feel something?”

Emile nodded, his eyebrows narrowing as he scribbled onto his clipboard.

“It is okay. You are not supposed to do anything you are unable to do. Do you generally feel things?”

Janus looked at him.  
For the first time during this session, Janus seemed lost. His usually so straightforward orbs were less strong compared to before. They were dark like coffee beans. Rather muddy and fizzy. The clear, nearly amber colour was gone and instead he was just one couple of coffee beans, somewhat straying from the rest.  
Being different.

“I feel things? I suppose. I do feel things - I mean, what are feelings anyway? Which feelings are we even talking about? I mean, what does define a feeling? Are we talking about feeling hungry because I am feeling hungry right now.”

The patient shrugged in reply. It was his closing statement to which the other nodded sagely.

“Alright-y. Feelings as in emotions. Your physiological urges are on another level. You have such urges as wanting to be recognised or valued personally but also for your work but you might also have urges such as being close to people or eating, drinking, sleeping, being safe. We need the emotional things. Those are the things we are talking about right now. Do you have any more questions about this?”

Janus shook his head and Emile slowly straightened his back and shoulders. He shifted in his seat and seemed to slowly put one leg over the other at a deliciously slow pace. He smiled, a shit-eating kinda grin as he beamed at the other.  
The patient wanted to puke just seeing this but he was unable to explain what it was or why but it felt like an urge rather than a feeling, if he understood the distinction between them properly.

“I have the feeling you might not experience any feelings such as emotions. The mental feelings that are not necessarily dependant of our bodies. Do you ever get angry or upset with people?”

Janus scowled.

“Maybe I am rude because I don’t understand your manners but I don’t get angry. I don’t care enough to be angry. I really don’t care for any of those things. When people are angry at me, I don’t get angry with them for it. I don’t ..care. It does not affect me. Others might do things that are bad for me but this is about it.”

He shrugged.

“What is there to do? If they get in my way, I will work around them or through them. Nothing is stopping me but the law and nothing is policing me but people who enforce the law.”

Orbs like steel pierced through Emile. The therapist found himself being slowly injured by intense stares boring into him.

“So, if someone is in your way, you do not get upset like other people but you do what’s needed to work as if they were not there?”

Janus nodded.

“This sounds effective, I think. Mind the law, we don’t want you to end up in jail.”

Slowly, the patient’s eyebrow rose. It arched beautifully as if in triumph. His chin seemed to lift just a tad and his cold stare buried itself deeply in Emile’s fears.  
When the other opened his mouth to speak, Janus moved his fingers to symbolise a stop but the gesture was more than enough for the therapist to shut himself up. He did not know what was riding him into such behaviour but he felt a force press him down when Janus’ hand remained in the position of “shutting him up”. He had pushed a button. Doctor Picani did not know which one but he did it and it felt like some evil kind of magic to him to be so controlled and limited by a patient.

His jaw was locked and refused to budge.  
It held itself in place, dominated by the fear induced by Janus’ mere movements... and these ebony orbs.

They were a dark danger glooming in the shadows.

“Nothing and nobody lands me in jail, doctor”, Janus started. His mouth moved so slowly, it seemed comical. At least Emile wanted it to be comical.   
He should have stayed with the cartoon references and his special therapy based on it.  
“If there is nobody around to witness me doing things, there is nobody pressing charges against me. As long as there are no charges against me, no law of court in the entire world has any grounds to put me into any kind of facility.”

His eyes were colder than dry ice.  
Emile could feel shivers by the presence.

“If you don’t do illegal things, you cannot end up caught in any way - whether someone or something witnesses what you do.”

The therapist had a strictness in his eyes which Janus vaguely nodded at.

“If it is illegal, it is bad manners, you say?”

He nodded.   
Janus made an “ah” sound.

“Well, I think this sounds a bit iffy. I am a confidential therapist but I advise you to stay true to the law and socially acceptable manners and attitudes. You are with people and you probably learn things by doing them or hearing about it. Social interactions will raise you right, in case your parents missed out.”

The patient shrugged once more.

“They did all they could, I suppose. They showed me how to live and act. I don’t always get it but it is okay. Others tell me, when I ask.”

Picani noted down more.  
It was safe to assume he was running out of space.

“I can help you, if you want to.”

Janus nodded.

“I came for this. Now, why would I care about the law, if I don’t hurt anyone. Or why would I care if I hurt someone but not in a bad way?”

He looked at Emile.

“Say, if I manipulated the polls to become class president, it does not really hurt anyone. Whether I am the vice or actual president and the other is then my vice president, there is not too much of a difference and it is nothing damaging.”

Emile shook his head.

“Oh well-”

“It is not fair.”

“What is fairness even. I think this is just a made-up concept people are lying about. Society oppresses minorities and laws are unfair but I have to be fair? Why need I be more correct than the system framing me for what I do?”

The therapist halted for a moment.  
He cleared his throat.

“I think you do not understand. It is not about -”

“Tsk.”

Emile’s eyes widened.  
Janus challenged him with eye contact and licked his lips. It felt like an excuse to show his obnoxious tongue. It was split at the tip. Just a bit but it was enough to be evident at first sight.

“Excuse me?”

Janus stood up and slowly started pacing in front of the couch. He was close to Emile but he never quite touched him when he passed his body.  
The therapist remained in his seat, holding onto the sides instead of writing onto the completely loaded piece of paper.

“Excuse you. There is injustice but when I, a mere person, am acting like this state is, then I am the criminal? This cannot be fair.”

He took adjusted his coat. It was long like a black cape but the insides were a sunny yellow.

“I decided. The world is not fair and you have not taught me any better. You and everyone else in here is failing the world and teaching me to be compliant to the laws of a lawless state.”

Emile got up as well.

“Sit down!”, he yelled, “I am not done with you, yet!”

Janus dismissively waved him off and turned to the door.

“You need someone to teach you about the law and you can leave right now but you will not keep me from having more pull than you do. You walk out of here, I will call the insurance and the police and get you into a psych ward. With my referral, you are unable to rule against it.”

He ripped the paper off the clip board and approached Janus, thrusting the formula into his chest.

“There. Go. You are fucking messed up. I thought you were alright in your head. Even a little compassion can hurt you in life, can keep you from achieving all these things you want to reach. But you are insane to come here and confess to breaking the law. You want to hurt people, don’t you?”

Janus took the paper.  
The time was frozen when he looked it over and rolled his eyes before slowly and agonisingly ripping it into pieces. The snow of wasted time reached the ground.

“I suggest you see a therapist, Doctor Emile. At the very least, I think I need you to see a lawyer to teach you about law.”

He pulled an audiotape out of his pocket and waved it in front of him before setting one down in front of him, clicking the button.  
His own voice started playing and Janus whistled at the sensation. Picani snatched it up and stared at the other. His fingers frantically clicked and grabbed at the thing in order to get it to shut up, shut up, just shut up!

“Oh, dear. This is a bummer.”

Janus’ voice was so calm against Emile’s rage, it ridiculed the professional.

His hand wandered back into his pocket where he pulled out a second tape.

“It would be..”, he looked at his hands, then back at Emile with mock-despair in his face,”too bad if someone was to report it. Anyone, really.”

He walked over to the door, his left hand reaching out for the hands but hovering above it.

“What did you say about.. fairness? About the law and justice? In this system, we are nothing but tiny sheep and we are powerless unless we change it up and refuse to bow before unrighteous rules that treat us unequally.”

Gloved fingers curled around the handle. Janus’ lips smacked together with a soft “plop” sound.

“I think, if you want to go, you are not a free man anymore, my dear doctor Picani.”

The handle bowed before the imbalanced couple and Janus pulled the door open to reveal a couple of professionals.

“We were called to look into a psychotherapeutic malpractice, Doctor Emile Picani.”

They walked in and Janus left the room to meet Logan outside.

“Thank you for calling me in time. It was not too much of a bad idea to go to the same therapist, after all.”

He winked at him and walked over to the car.

“Get in. I will get you to a hospital and find real care for you.”

**Author's Note:**

> End Note: This is not how a therapist should treat you. If someone treats you or your issues like that, please make sure you leave immediately and report this. A real therapist will validate your concerns and try to redirect your thoughts. If you have mental health issues, please reach out for help. They can have several different causes. It makes sense to contact a GP and work with a therapist and even psychiatrist if needed.  
> You do not need a certain age, trauma or circumstance in order to develop mental health issues. Aversive Childhood Experiences (ACEs) increase the risk but it depends on many more. Don’t let anyone invalidate your needs. If you need help, you usually know yourself best and understand life is harder than it should be. Keep looking for the adequate support you deserve and need!


End file.
